Not Quite Hall Of Famers

Don Drysdale: rode Sandy Koufax' shirttails all the way to Cooperstown.

Dizzy Dean: 150 wins in 12 years? Granted, won 20+ games four times but look at his losses in those years and also his WHIP. Might be the only guy who talked his way in.

Carlton Fisk: Agree with the above, and not even the best catcher in the AL East. That honor belonged to Thurman.

And all the Negro Leaguers that went in last year.

Phil Rizzuto - Tremendous glove, but only an average bat, at best. He had only one great season.

Johnny Evers - Are you kidding me? Glove was okay and he had about three good offensive seasons. Not once did he have a season where one could mistake him for a Hall-of-Famer.

Carlton Fisk has what I'll call the "Ozzie Smith Effect", in that he's big on charisma, since he had what's been called baseball's greatest moment, with his 1975 World Series home run. Ozzie Smith was elected in good part because of his very endearing backflips, which were sure crowd pleasers.

As for Bruce Sutter, I've never understood the reverence for him.

I wasn't alive when Don Dyrsdale pitched and haven't ever looked up his numbers, but if you're a nice guy and have a good TV career, and at least a reasonably good MLB career, that greatly increases your chance on getting into the HoF with the Ozzie Smith Effect.

The veterans committee destroyed the inetgrity of the Hall of Fame years ago. It's a shame that it took so long for the rules to be changed. The Veterans Committee as currently formulated (living hall of fame members, writers and broadcasters) has yet to induct anyone. The list of undeserving players let in by the old veterans committee is long. Here's a few of the undeserving: Phil Rizzuto, Pee Wee Reese, Orlando Cepeda, Jim Bunning, Hal Newhouser, Tony Lazzeri, Enos Slaughter, Rick Ferrell, George Kell, Hack Wilson, etc. The list goes on and on. The abuses by the veterans committee were such that you could make an argument for practically anybody who played for 15 years, made a couple of all-star teams and played on a pennant winner (e.g., how come Larry Bowa, Alan trammell and Dave Concepcion aren't in the hall when they have better numbers than Pee Wee Reese and Phil Rizzuto). The Veterans committee started the hall down the slippery slope and it's hard to turn back. The Hall no longer just celebrates the best of the best. Should Pee Wee Reese and Cal Ripken be celebrated in the same way? They are by the Hall of Fame. Of recent players who were voted in Bruce Sutter and Tony Perez come to mind as particularly unworthy of the honor. I also have my doubts about Kirby Puckett, but I'm not going to get into that because soooo many people love Kirby, but if you look at his career objectively, you'll see that it was no better than Bernie Williams' and Bernie's might actually be better. But Bernie should never get within sniffing distance of a plaque in Cooperstown.

Excellent comment, mycue. And is exactly why the Hall of Fame re-did the Veterans Committee. What used to be a process of a bunch of old fart sportswriters voting in their buddies has been turned over to the most qualified group, the Hall of Famers themselves. I look at your names and agree with most of them and disagree with them too. Kind of a glass half full/glass half empty situation. I can also take out/add additional players without much trouble. And to your Bernie/Kirby reference, Bernie is going into his 18th season, Kirby played 12. Six more years to accomplish relatively similar numbers, and the voters also gave Kirby the benefit of the doubt because of the circumstances of his retirement. If he had played 18 years he likely would have had 3000 hits.

I really do hate saying anything about Saint Kirby, because I know that people will always come to his defense, but if you check out the comparison between Kirby stats at the end of his career and Bernie's through a similar number of at bats( http://www.b...p;compage=34), you will see that Bernie actually leads Kirby in most stats. Kirby leads in hits and BA, But Bernie leads in runs, home runs, walks, Rbi's, Slugging %, Stolen bases, On base percentage and OPS+ (and by a significant margin in most categories). And Bernie actually accomplished that in about 300 fewer at bats. I have also talked about Kirby in comparison to Albert Belle, but the argument against Belle (besides the fact that he was an absolute Ahole) is that he didn't play long enough. However with Kirby, he is always given the benefit of the doubt (he would have gotten to x, and z if he hadn't been hurt).

Kirby was a very good consistent player for a period of ten years. I would say that if you look at the stats, Bernie can match those stats and he was an integral part of twice as many World series winning teams. I will end this comment by saying, that I honestly don't think that Bernie is a Hall of Famer. Unfortunately, he doesn't meet my rigorous standards. The standard for the Hall of Fame should not be if you were one of the best players of your day, but were you one of the best players of all time at your position. Does Bernie measure up to Willie, Mickey, Ty, Cool Papa Bell, Oscar Charleston, Joe Dimaggio, Tris Speaker? The answer is clearly no. However I believe the answer is just as clear for Kirby as well.

And one more thing, Manny, the All-Star game is a popularity contest. I put very little stock into how many times you were on that team. How many times have you seen fans vote in their favorites over more deserving players? I would say it happens multiple times every year.